


Because Everyone Loves Puppies

by PettyMermaidsGf



Category: Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Enabler Rose Tico, Enemies to Friends to Lovers, Everything is Beautiful and Nothing Hurts, Finn Needs A Hug (Star Wars), Fluff and Hurt/Comfort, Getting Together, Grumpy Finn Skywalker, M/M, Observant Leia Organa, Puppies Made Me Do It, Sunshine Poe Dameron, Tooth-Rotting Fluff, don't blame me okay? blame the puppies!!, except they're not really enemies and Finn is just an eternal grouch, oh and lastly (but still important) Finn is autistic bc I said so, this isn't actually all that Mature™ but there was a really quick reference to adult ish so
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-05
Updated: 2020-11-05
Packaged: 2021-03-08 22:48:38
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,244
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27394489
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/PettyMermaidsGf/pseuds/PettyMermaidsGf
Summary: It is a universal truth seldom acknowledged that most everyone loves puppies, or something like that. Enter Rose, Leia and Poe in their dastardly plans to get Finn Skywalker to relax and stop being such a moody British fuckwad all the time...and also maybe sort-of kind-of absolutely date Poe too (which wasn't actually part of the original plan, dammit).
Relationships: Finn & Rey (Star Wars), Poe Dameron/Finn
Comments: 5
Kudos: 38





	Because Everyone Loves Puppies

**Author's Note:**

> Because everything continues to be horrible, I probably have a mild but exhausting case of COVID-19, and my lovely friend & college wifey sent me a wholesome meme that goes like this:
> 
> Guy: how many puppies does it take to screw in a lightbulb? Do you know yet? 
> 
> Me (in a sea of puppies): No, they haven't done it. Bring more.

Finn loves his job at the local animal shelter - most of the time. It’s a pretty good first gig out of college, it’ll look great on his resume (everyone loves animal shelters, even arseholes like him), and they provide pretty decent benefits like, y’know, actual health insurance and two weeks of paid vacation time.

Like he said, most days he absolutely loves his job. He usually spends his days looking after the dogs in their kennels, feeding the fish and other marine life, and brushing the rabbits until their coats are soft, shiny, and ultra-fluffy. And for reasons he’s yet to uncover, the shelter’s Instagram feed goes absolutely insane for clips of freshly-brushed bunnies gnawing on celery sticks and carrots. The last time he’d posted, they’d gotten nearly three-hundred-thousand views from all over the country in around four or five hours. 

There’s a bakery just down the street where he’s convinced the pastry chefs throw the windows open just to taunt his senses with the tantalizing smells of freshly spun sugar for their rock candy, caramelized maple-bacon cupcakes, and the decadent aroma of pumpkin and blueberry pies right out of the oven. It’s absolutely _unseemingly_. Marry that with the flower shop across the street where his best-friend Rey works and a lovely indie bookstore a couple blocks down, and this is usually the sort of thing his friends most envy him for - the fact that he lives in stupidly-quaint, small town America. And he usually loves this town, his job, and working with his co-workers.

Except today? Today is dead-set on not being one of those days. He feels like absolute shit this morning, his car kept stalling out in the apartment parking lot, the local coffee shop had royally fucked up his order _and_ burnt his bloody apple-cranberry muffin (how? Seriously, _how?_ ), and then his biological-mother called while he was stuck in traffic on the way to work. So he’s moody, over-tired, and admittedly not in the best of headspaces when he finally pulls the door open and brings the cold November chill right along with him.

Finn shivers from the chill and tries stomping the last of the snow off his boots and onto the welcome mats. Maybe a little more aggressively than usual, because Poe, the gorgeous and bright-eyed shelter veteran of the bunch, looks up from the circulation desk and says, “Damn, what’d the floor-mat do to you, buddy?”

He’s all lean muscle, tawny complexion, dark eyes and perfectly curly hair Finn wants to sink his fingers into - just to see if the guy uses some sort of super-holding gel from the gods that resists all musing and tousling, obviously. And it’s not like Finn actually _wants_ to muse or tousle Poe’s hair, because that’d be ridiculous and unprofessional and weird and-

“Dunno, mate, what’d it do to your hair?” Finn shoots back before he finishes off the last dregs of his coffee, and Poe looks personally offended.

He can’t tell if it’s from the jab or Finn’s taste in local coffee joints. Frankly, he’s in such a sour mood that he doesn’t really care. He shrugs out of his coat and gloves and leaves them hanging on the coat rack with everyone else’s things, then blows warm air into his hands to ward off the last of the chill from outside.

“You seen Rey around lately?” He asks in a softer tone, trying to be less of a dick now because he knows his bad mood isn’t Poe’s fault in the least bit. Granted, he's usually in a bad mood he assumes is more or less a permanent feature of his personality at this stage in the game, much like his late-diagnosed autism and bitter hatred of Starbucks coffee. 

Poe shakes his head and says that Finn must’ve just missed her, but they could probably meet for lunch or something later.

Between the call with his biological mother on the drive over, the absolute shit coffee he’s just subjected himself to, and missing his morning pick-me-up conversation with Rey, he’s convinced this morning could not possibly get any worse.

Or at least that is until Rose peeks her head out from the kennel room and says, “Hey, lightbulb just went out” in her usual matter-of-fact way. She chews on a piece of bubble gum for a long moment and then grins and asks, “Sooo either of you particularly good at changing one? Because Leia will absolutely _kill me_ if this isn’t fixed by the time she gets back from the store-”

And Finn just about loses his shit because it’s the last fucking straw this morning. “Jesus fucking Christ, you have _got_ to be kidding me.” 

Rose looks back and forth between him and Poe and starts to ask, “Is something- I mean are you-” She gestures wordlessly between them, but mostly at Finn, because it’s obvious he’s being a complete and total arse right now, like way more than usual, and finishes, “Do you guys need a minute?”

To which Finn can't help but grind out, “ _No_ , I’m fine, actually” sounding like the moody, sleep-deprived, British toddler he is and Poe calls out, “Yes, absolutely” at the same time. 

Then Poe meets his gaze and Finn huffs and looks away and says, “Really, I’m alright.”

That earns him a laugh and an overly-indulgent, “Yeah, says the guy who wasn’t wrestling with a coat hanger and calling it an absolute wanker five minutes ago. But you do you, my guy, you do you.”

Finn scoffs at that and waves a dismissive hand, but he can hear the slightest twinge of laughter in his own voice anyway. Dammit. “I couldn’t get the hanger on right and-” Then he tilts his head to the side and studies the expression on Poe’s face, understanding slowly dawning on him. 

“ _Waait_ , are you trying to shrink me right now?” The laughter in his voice falls away as suddenly as it’d come, and he’s back to being his usual moody, sullen self. “Because I’m not about to spill my guts and tell you all my problems the minute you do the All-American-boy-next-door routine, sorry.”

Now it’s Poe’s turn to look at him with new eyes, warm and interested and just this side of casual when he asks, “Boy-next-door routine, hm? What’s that supposed to mean, like is that something you’re into?”

The low note in Poe’s voice has him instantly thinking of horribly stereotypical porn categories and the secret browsing tabs from his college days and now flustered, Finn stammers out a, “No, obviously not, I was just-”

“Mhm, you were just. Right, well, if you’d mind doing a little less of that while we’re fixing this bulb, that’d be great.” Poe says now as he shoves a step-ladder against Finn’s chest before he heads to the other room. He stares on after him for a beat, curses his absolutely horrible luck today, and then follows him back to the kennel so they can get to work.

Rose grins brightly at them as they walk in and says, “Aww, how sweet, the newly-weds finally made up!”

At that, Poe proceeds to try murdering her seven ways to Sunday with his gaze while Finn just pinches the bridge of his nose in outright irritation and says, “Right, can we get on with it, then?”

She pats Poe on the arm and teases him about the honeymoon phase going well, to which he sighs and mutters something that sounds like _ah, but don’t they always?_

Fin tries his best to ignore them as he climbs up the oversized stairs to inspect the bulb - it’s definitely dead alright, but he’s not sure if it’s the lightbulb itself or if the entire fuse is blown. And it’s more or less the only working light in the room at the moment, so. This’ll be a fun day indeed, fucking around trying to fix a lightbulb in the near dark. He messes with it for a bit but can’t manage to unscrew the bulb from the socket, so Poe gives it a try.

And Finn is absolutely not staring at Poe’s perfect face or his perfect hair or his perfect ass in those jeans as he gets onto the step ladder and stretches his perfect arm muscles out towards the ceiling. He is not. And Rose absolutely does not catch him staring, nor does she cross her arms over her chest and give him a very _oh, I knew it_ look, because there’s nothing _to_ catch, dammit.

After a couple minutes, Poe sighs and turns his head towards them to declare, “Well, that was no use. Think it’s time to call in the cavalry.” Then he raises a brow at Rose and says, “You wanna do the honors, babe?”

Finn stares back and forth between them in total confusion. “Wait, what’s happening?” He _really_ hopes he didn’t walk into the middle of their badly-timed public indecency video, because as much as he likes Poe in those jeans…

“Oh, absolutely.” Rose cackles at the look of abject horror on Finn’s face and Poe flicks a switch, all the lights coming on at once and flooding the room with a warm, yellow glow. Like they were never out in the first place. He stares at both his co-workers in total confusion before Rose slams a button on the remote control in her hand - the remote control that simultaneously unlocks every kennel in the room.

A tiny herd of puppies crashes out of their cages and into the space, jumping all over the three of them, wagging their tails, and knocking over carts full of extra water bowls, dog food, and chew toys in their overexcited glee and amusement. But a number of them go right for Finn and tackle him to the floor, and his gaze goes flying to Poe’s own as he stands on the ladder, looking amused and much too proud for this to be anything _but_ purposeful.

“You...so both of you...but when did- and why?” Finn asks as a couple of tiny labrador puppies viciously attack his face with kisses and enthusiastically paw at his shirt. At some point, he’d intended for that to be a full, coherent sentence, but he’d lost the point somewhere between a puppy trying to gnaw on his ear and another bodily sitting down on his ribcage. 

And Poe just grins at him and says, “Hey Finn, how many puppies does it take to screw in a lightbulb?” Then he looks to Rose and stage-whispers, “You think he knows yet?”

From his spot on the floor, Finn snuggles a chocolate lab to his chest and then kisses a tiny pitbull mix on her wrinkly little forehead before answering, “Not sure, mate, they haven’t done it yet. Could you bring more?”

Rose cackles again and gives another round of puppies the go-ahead to charge, attack, and do their worst. Finn lays down in a sea of puppies for another half-hour, happy and content and even trying to baby-talk a couple of them into bullying Poe instead, when in comes his boss and her unfairly good-looking husband.

Leia takes one look around the kennel room and demands, “Dameron, what is the meaning of this?” And then, in a gentler tone, “I thought you learned your lesson the last time, Poe.”

Poe smiles back and says, “Ah, you know me, General. Always getting into trouble over the cute ones.”

Leia casts a glance towards Finn as he lays amidst a sea of puppies on the floor, _tsks_ at the chaotic mess around them, and then her composure breaks and she finally smiles as she points out, “Y’know, some of the absolute shittiest days in my life were made better with dogs, wine, and a little something else.”

Then she nods her head towards Poe and says, “That one’s your something else, kid, and I am begging you to take him out for a spin. Preferably somewhere dimly-lit, stupid expensive, and far away from here. Maybe not _too_ fruity though, if you catch my drift.”

To which Finn and Poe both look at each other and exclaim, “Wait, what?!” before they protest.

But it’s too late - because now Leia has the kennel remote and she gives a rather terrifying grin before she releases the last three puppies and gives BB-8, C3PO, and R2D2 permission to do _their_ worst. Poe lasts some four impressive minutes before the hyperactive, cuddly little shits drag him to the floor right alongside Finn.

It’s there, laughing and out of breath and grateful for this wonderfully weird, fucked-up mess of a day, that Finn says, “So I can definitely do dimly-lit, but I’m down for somewhere fruity if you are.”

And Poe grins at Finn and wagers, “And I’m game if you are, but only if I get a shot at kissing you afterwards.”

Finn laughs, nods, and says, “Yeah, mate, just don’t go rush-ordering a U-Haul on me the day after, alright?”

For the record, Poe looks like he could order one right about now and Finn has to try and resist the horrible urge to smile when he punches him in the arm - and he totally blows it and ends up smiling anyway. Leia vows to kick them out of the animal shelter before they can even _think_ of making out on her kennel floor, and Rose laughs again and insists that maybe the honeymoon phase can be saved after all.

**Author's Note:**

> I regret nothing and I'm not sorry. Don't forget to comment, like and subscribe for-
> 
> owait this isn't youtube srry 😝 But seriously, please lemme know if y'all would read a lil mini-series on these two because I've decided I actually freaking LOVE writing British, ultra-grumpy!Finn and totalsunshine!Poe, they're fucking adorable together 🥺💗


End file.
